The Nationals traded Jose Vidro to the Mariners for a young pitcher and an outfielder who has been injured more often than Ken Griffey Jr. Felipe Lopez will move from shortstop to second to make room for the return of Cristian Guzman. Let me get this straight: you wouldn’t move Vidro to let Soriano play second, but you’ll move Vidro so you can break the logjam at shortstop for Guzman? The same Guzman who missed all of 2006 with an injury after batting .219 in 2005? Good thing they cleared some salary so they can sign Soriano back…oh wait.
Daisuke Matsuzaka is about to sign a 6-year, $52 million contract with Boston. Usually I don’t like paying players huge amounts of money when they have no major league experience, but for a number of reasons this is an unusual case. The contract is not too large, especially considering the market – if Gil Meche is worth 5 years, $55 million, then this is a good signing. When you count the posting fee, however (and I don’t think you can ignore it), then you are paying Matsusaka about $17M per. So I hope he throws complete games, because you still don’t have a closer.
Vernon Wells received a massive contract offer from the Blue Jays. When the Blue Jays are offering someone the 6th largest contract in Major League history, you know there is something wrong with the market. Maybe they know something about the Canadian exchange rate that I don’t.
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Ha Ha, nice quips. But yea, the thing about Matsuzaka (someone need to coin an easy nickname immediately...Zaka Shulu?) is that his worth goes so far beyond his pitching. First of all, while you can't ignore the posting fee, the Red Sox do get a little bit of it back considering the fee doesn't hit the luxury tax. I don't know the exact numbers, but they save a few million in luxury tax on signing D-Mat to a Zito-esk contract (including the posting fee) over signing Zito himself. Second, as far as marketing, you aren't signing one player, you're signing an entire country. D-Mat jerseys will probably sell like most other pitchers in the US, but in Japan, everyone will have one. Add in the benefits of overseas broadcast dollars, and this contract may pay for itself. Oh yea, and he may turn out to be a great pitcher, too...
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